Digital cable and satellite have begun to change the nature of home entertainment by vastly expanding the choices available to consumers. Digital Video Recorders and Video-On-Demand have made “appointment TV” unnecessary by putting the consumer in charge of when they wish to view. However, the problem of where to watch has been mostly unanswered by these new devices.
In a typical home, a consumer is watching audio/visual (herein “multimedia”) content from one of several typical sources. Examples of such typical sources include:                Video cassette recorder/player (VCR) and its video tapes;        DVD player/recorder and its DVD disks;        Digital video recorder (DVR) and its secondary storage device (such as a hard disk). These are sometimes called personal video recorders (PVRs); and        Live television (“Live TV”) broadcast via cable, satellite dish, or antennae. This may include video-on-demand (VOD) or pay-per-view (PPV).        
Of course, these are just examples of typical sources and other such sources may exist.
Base Scenario
The following describes the base scenario considered herein:                An environment has multimedia presentation systems at multiple different loci in the environment. For example, a home may have multiple television sets and each one is in a different room. One may be in the living room, one in each of 3 bedrooms, and another in the game room.        Multimedia content is being viewed at one of the presentation systems at one of the loci. For example, a person is watching a movie in the living room.        The viewer moves to another locus in the environment, but wishes to continuing watching the same multimedia content that she was viewing at the previous locus. For example, a person goes to the bedroom, but wants to continue to watch the same movie that they were watching in the living room.        More particularly, the viewer may want to continue watching the same multimedia content at the new locus exactly at the point where she ceased viewing the content at the previous locus. For example, a person may go to the kitchen, but wants to continue to watch the same movie exactly at the point where she paused it in the living room.Conventional Approaches        
With all of the conventional approaches, each of the presentation systems (e.g., televisions) at each locus (e.g., rooms) has its own source of the multimedia content. Examples of such sources include the VCR, DVD player, DVR, and Live TV.
None of the conventional approaches allow a viewer to pick-up a presentation of multimedia content in a new location, at the point where the viewer stopped viewing it in the original location.
The following describes how to accomplish this base scenario using conventional approaches.
VCR: The viewer must stop the tape at the original locus and take it with her to the new locus. The new locus must have its own VCR to play the tape. The viewer may put the tape in the VCR at the new locus and it will start playing where the viewer stopped it in the original locus.
DVD: The viewer must stop the DVD player at the original locus and take the DVD disk with her to the new locus. The new locus must have its own DVD player. When the viewer loads the DVD into the DVD player of the new location, the typical DVD players will start playing the DVD at the very beginning. The user will have to manually jump ahead to a point on the DVD disk that is close to where she stopped viewing at the original locus.
DVR: There is no conventional technology that allows the user to accomplish this base scenario. Since the source of the multimedia content remains in the DVR at the original locus, the viewer is not able to pick exactly where she left off viewing in the original locus. If the DVR has a removable media, then this approach is more like the VCR or DVD approach.
Live TV: The viewer is not able to stop or pause live television broadcast. The viewer may watch the same broadcast at another locus, but the viewer will not be able to continue from exactly where she paused the broadcast at the original locus. While a DVR is capable of “pausing” live TV, there is no conventional technology that allows for the user to resume watching such paused live TV at another locus.
Alternative Scenario
In addition to the base scenario provided above, assume that another viewer wishes to continue to watch the multimedia content at the original locus (or at another locus) when the first viewer leaves to go view the content at still another locus.
For example, assume that there are two people watching a recorded movie. One person “pauses” the movie and leaves the room to go to another room in the house. However, the remaining person continues to watch the movie. The person who left the room wishes to resume watching the movie in a new room. Although another person continues to watch the movie in the original room, the person who left the room wishes to resume watching exactly where she “paused” it.
None of the current approaches addresses this alternative scenario.